[00:00:19] What's in the box? Whatever it is must be pretty important cuz I've traveled with it, moved it from apartment [00:00:28] to apartment, to [00:00:35] apartment. Sound familiar?
Did you know that we Americans have about three times the amount of space we did 50 [00:00:43] years ago? Three times. So you'd think with all this extra space we'd have plenty of room for all our [00:00:51] stuff, right? Nope.
There's a new industry in town, a $22 billion, 2.2 billion square foot industry: that of personal storage. [00:01:03] So we've got triple the space, but we become such good shoppers that we need even more space.
So where [00:01:10] does this lead? Lots of credit card debt, huge environmental footprints, and perhaps not coincidentally, our happiness levels flatline over [00:01:21] the same 50 years.
Well, I'm here to suggest there's a better way. That less might actually equal more. I [00:01:28] bet most of us have experienced at some point the joys of less: college, your dorm, traveling in a hotel [00:01:38] room, camping where you got basically nothing, maybe a boat. Whatever it was for you, I bet that among other [00:01:46] things, this gave you a little more freedom, a little more time.
So I want to suggest that less stuff [00:01:54] and less space are going to equal a smaller footprint. It's actually a great way to save you some money, and [00:02:00] it's going to give you a little more ease in your life.
So I started a project called LifeEdited at [00:02:04] lifeedited.org to further this conversation and to find some great solutions in this area. First up, crowdsourcing my [00:02:13] 420 sq ft apartment in Manhattan with partners Mutopo and Jovoto.com.
I wanted it all: home office, sit down dinner for 10, [00:02:23] room for guests, and all my kite surfing gear. With over 300 entries from around the world, I got it. [00:02:30] My own little jewel box.
By buying a space that was 420 sq ft instead of 600, immediately I'm saving 200 [00:02:39] grand. Smaller space is going to make for smaller utilities, save some more money there, but also a smaller [00:02:47] footprint. And because it's really designed around an edited set of possessions—my favorite stuff—and really designed for me, [00:02:54] I'm really excited to be there.
So how can you live little? Three main approaches. First of all, you need [00:03:01] to edit ruthlessly. We've got to clear the arteries of our lives. That shirt that I haven't worn in years, [00:03:10] it's time for me to let it go. We've got to cut the extraneous out of our lives, and we've [00:03:15] got to learn to stem the inflow.
We need to think before we buy. Ask ourselves, "Is that really going [00:03:21] to make me happier, truly?" By all means, we should buy and own some great stuff, but we want stuff [00:03:30] that we're going to love for years, not just stuff.
Secondly, our new mantra: small is sexy. We want space [00:03:38] efficiency. We want things that are designed for how they're used the vast majority of the time, not that rare [00:03:44] event. Why have a six-burner stove when you rarely use three? So we want things that nest, we want [00:03:52] things that stack, and we want to digitize. You can take paperwork, books, movies, and you can make it disappear. [00:04:00] It's magic.
Finally, we want multifunctional spaces and housewares. A sink combined with a toilet, a dining table becomes a [00:04:09] bed—same space. A little side table stretches out to seat 10.
In the winning LifeEdited scheme in a [00:04:17] render here, we combine a moving wall with transformer furniture to get a lot out of the space. Look at [00:04:23] the coffee table—it grows in height and width to seat 10. My office folds away, easily hidden.
My bed [00:04:33] just pops out of the wall with two fingers. Guests move the moving wall, have some fold-down guest beds, and [00:04:41] of course, my own movie theater.
So I'm not saying that we all need to live in 420 square ft. [00:04:47] But consider the benefits of an edited life. Go from 3,000 to 2,000, from 1,500 to 1,000. Most of us, [00:04:56] maybe all of us, are here pretty happily for a bunch of days with a couple bags, maybe a small space hotel [00:05:02] room.
So when you go home and you walk through your front door, take a second and ask yourselves, could [00:05:08] I do with a little life editing? Would that give me a little more freedom? Maybe a little more [00:05:16] time?
What's in the box? It doesn't really matter. I know I don't need it. What's in yours? Maybe, just [00:05:29] maybe, less might equal more. So let's make room for the good stuff. [00:05:48] Thank you.